HOW DONALD TRUMP HAS DISRUPTED THE MEDIA:

From The Weekly Standard, citing a new Pew media study:

…something about Trump has made the news media strikingly self-referential. Pew identified nine major types of sources relied on for coverage of Trump’s first 100 days. (The Pew researchers did not cite how often anonymous sources were used, which might have been an interesting bit of data.) The most commonly cited source, understandably, was the president or someone from his administration. But the next most commonly used source—employed 35 percent of the time —was not members of Congress, or experts, or everyday citizens, but “another news organization or journalist.”

“One of the things that was interesting to see was that, while the topic of the news media was not a huge percentage of overall coverage, journalists were both the second most common source type as well as the second most common ‘trigger’ of the stories,” says Amy Mitchell, director of the Pew Research Center.*

That might go some way in explaining the elite media feedback loop..

“Elite media feedback loop.” Is that another way of saying leftist bubble babble echo chamber?

MALE PRIVILEGE: Man dies saving Maryland woman during Las Vegas shooting.

INTERESTING QUOTE FROM LAS VEGAS SHERIFF ABOUT THE SHOOTER’S MOTIVE IN THIS STORY: Las Vegas shooter’s girlfriend returns to US as police reveal details of his planning. Here: “This person may have been radicalised, unbeknownst to us, and we want to identify that source.”

GIVEN THAT THE SPLC IS SOMETHING OF A CROSS BETWEEN A HATE GROUP AND A SCAM, THAT SEEMS RIGHT: DOD Drops SPLC From Extremism Training Materials.

AS BENGHAZI’S PORT RE-OPENS WARRING LIBYAN FACTIONS START TO TALK: Libya is a mess. However, Tobruk government (eastern government) forces have been defeating opposition Islamist militias and consolidating control in their region. Fighting shut down commercial operations in Benghazi’s port for three years. A few days ago it re-opened. So, stay tuned.

NANCY PELOSI: “We didn’t win the elections, but we’ve won every fight.”

She thinks the Democrats have an “excellent” chance of re-taking the House of Representatives.

When asked what would be different if Democrats were in power, she responds by saying that unlike Republicans, Democrats are bipartisan. Anyone who remembers the passage of Obamacare, might disagree with that.

She then goes on to say how wonderful Democrats were to work with George W. Bush, while insulting him at the same time.

Counting on the other side to surrender preemptively isn’t usually a smart strategy, but it seems to be working well enough this year for Capitol Hill Democrats.

MICHAEL BARONE: Michael Barone: California Democrats’ early presidential primary: Unintended consequences?

California doesn’t vote much like the rest of the nation any more. It favored Hillary Clinton over Donald Trump by a 30 point margin, the second most Democratic result (after Hawaii) in the nation. California voted 1 to 3 percent more Democratic than the nation in 1988, 1992 and 1996. Since then it has shifted to become more Democratic than the national result: 5 percent more in 2000, 6 percent more in 2004, 8 percent more in 2008, 9 percent more in 2012 and 13 percent more in 2016. This is the first time in American history that our largest state has voted at one end of the partisan spectrum.

These results make mincemeat of the argument that California ought to go first because it’s typical of the nation as a whole. And of course California’s large size means it can’t be the kind of venue where personal campaigning and grassroots organization can propel an otherwise little known candidate ahead, as Iowa and New Hampshire have repeatedly done.

Quite the contrary: California requires huge amounts of money and favors candidates with national (or California) name identification. Perhaps that would help Kamala Harris, elected California’s attorney general in 2010 and 2014 and U.S. senator in 2016. But it’s not clear that helping Harris helps the Democratic party. She seems well to the left of Hillary Clinton on many issues, and while that’s not a general election problem in California, it could be in most of the rest of the country.

I see no downside to this.

LAUNCHING A BLACKJACK: U.S. Marines in the Med aboard the USS San Diego (LPD 22) prepare to launch a Blackjack small tactical unmanned aircraft.

FAKE NEWS: “Fox, IJR, Hannity radio, and Breitbart were more likely to publish a negative story about Trump than the New York Times, Vox, Politico, Washington Post, et al, were to publish a positive one.”

BILL GERTZ: China’s Secret Military Plan: Invade Taiwan by 2020.

China has drawn up secret military plans to take over the island of Taiwan by 2020, an action that would likely lead to a larger U.S.-China conventional or nuclear war, according to newly-disclosed internal Chinese military documents.

The secret war plan drawn up by the People’s Liberation Army (PLA), the Chinese Communist Party’s armed forces, calls for massive missile attacks on the island, along with a naval and air blockade that is followed by amphibious beach landing assaults using up to 400,000 troops.

The plans and operations are outlined in a new book published this week, The Chinese Invasion Threat by Ian Easton, a China affairs analyst with the Project 2049 Institute, a think tank.

The danger of a Taiwan conflict has grown in recent years even as current tensions between Washington and Beijing are mainly the result of U.S. opposition to Chinese militarization in the South China Sea and China’s covert support of North Korea’s nuclear and missile programs.

“Of all the powder kegs out there, the potential for a war over Taiwan is by far the largest and most explosive,” the 290-page book states, adding that the growing likelihood of a war over Taiwan will dominate worries within the Pentagon for years to come.

It’s difficult to imagine how China would get more out of forcibly annexing Taiwan than they’d lose in a major shooting war — but then the decision to go to war is rarely made so rationally.

STEVE SCALISE: Scalise: Shooting ‘fortified’ my view on gun rights.

House Majority Whip Steve Scalise (R-La.) says that getting shot at the GOP baseball practice over the summer — and nearly losing his life as a result — has strengthened his views against gun control.

Fox News’s Martha MacCallum asked Scalise in an interview to be aired later Tuesday if his experience and the deadly mass shooting in Las Vegas on Sunday night have changed his views about the Constitution’s Second Amendment.

“I think it’s fortified it,” Scalise said.

Echoing comments made by other congressional Republicans and the White House, Scalise said that lawmakers should focus on supporting victims and law enforcement before advocating for a legislative response.

“Because first of all you’ve got to recognize that when there’s a tragedy like this, the first thing we should be thinking about is praying for the people who were injured and doing whatever we can to help them, to help law enforcement. We shouldn’t first be thinking of promoting our political agenda,” Scalise said.

Scalise’s congressional website notes that his support gun rights has earned him an A-plus rating from the National Rifle Association. The bills he has supported over the years would ease interstate gun sales and ensure national reciprocity for concealed-carry permit holders.

Two things worth passing.

LIZ SHELD’S MORNING BRIEF: Las Vegas Massacre Day Three and Much, Much More.

UNEXPECTEDLY: Leftist Anti-Gun Group Refuses to ‘Let a Good Crisis Go to Waste’ After Vegas Shooting.

ALEXA, I’D LIKE FRIES WITH THAT: Shake Shack Replaces Humans With Robots.. “Fast-food chain was once hailed by President Obama for paying high entry-level wages.”

A forthcoming Shake Shack location in New York City—where the Obamas are looking to live in retirement—plans to open with a workforce of robots rather than human employees, according to the New York Post. A restaurant set to open in the East Village will be staffed with robot ordering kiosks, which do not accept cash. Diners will place orders on apps and receive alerts via text message with a few “hospitality champs” on site to address potential tech glitches in the new machinery.

“The Astor Place Shack will be a playground where we can test and learn the ever-shifting needs of our guests,” Shake Shack CEO Randy Garutti told the New York Post. “[It] represents our dedication to innovation and to providing the best for our guests and for our teams.”

The restaurant plans to ramp up wages for those employees lucky enough to find work at the mechanized restaurant. Garutti said starting wages will be $15 an hour—more than double the federal minimum and the rate endorsed by political giant Service Employees International Union (SEIU) and the 2016 Democratic Party Platform. Labor watchdogs said the higher wages do not make up for the lost opportunities for entry-level workers.

You don’t say.

ROBBY SOAVE: If You Think Trump Is a Fascist, You Should Oppose Gun Control.

Following the unfathomably tragic events in Las Vegas, many on the left are demanding that Congress pass new restrictions on guns. Such calls make even less sense than usual, given what much of the left already believes about the current political environment: that a fascist occupies the White House.

“Yes, Donald Trump is a fascist,” wrote The New Republic’s Jamil Smith. He said that in 2015, when Trump was still merely a primary challenger; associating Trump with fascism has grown only more common in the two years since.

“This is how fascism comes to America,” wrote Robert Kagan, a former Republican, in a Washington Post piece widely shared last year on both the left and the NeverTrump right: “not with jackboots and salutes (although there have been salutes, and a whiff of violence) but with a television huckster, a phony billionaire, a textbook egomaniac ‘tapping into’ popular resentments and insecurities, and with an entire national political party—out of ambition or blind party loyalty, or simply out of fear—falling into line behind him.”

“Trump’s not Hitler,” wrote Salon’s Fedja Buric in 2016. But that was only because: “He’s Mussolini.” Buric’s article is about “How GOP anti-intellectualism created a modern fascist movement in America.”

The Daily Beast’s Jay Michaelson held out until Trump pardoned Sheriff Joe Arpaio, at which point he declared, “at a certain point, ‘fascist’ becomes the most accurate term to describe what this man does….’Fascist’ is not an incendiary slur—it is an accurate description.”

Those are high-profile writers; grassroots activists have been less measured. The antifa movement, which for some reason thinks smashing windows and setting cars on fire is an effective form of resistance, regularly claims that Trump is a modern incarnation of Nazism. Left-leaning students and professors frequently accuse Trump of fascism; some have even maintained that members of Trump’s Cabinet, like Education Secretary Betsy DeVos, are white supremacists by mere association. . . .

Which brings us back to gun control, something countless liberal pundits and Democratic congresspeople are breathlessly demanding right now. How on earth could anyone believe both that Trump is a fascist and that it’s a good idea for a federal government he runs to take guns away from law-abiding citizens? If Trump is a budding Mussolini—let alone something worse—then you shouldn’t want to give him the power required to wage a war on guns.

You’d think.

DRAINING THE SWAMP — YOU’RE DOING IT WRONG: IRS awards multimillion-dollar fraud-prevention contract to Equifax.

A contract award for Equifax’s data services was posted to the Federal Business Opportunities database Sept. 30 — the final day of the fiscal year. The credit agency will “verify taxpayer identity” and “assist in ongoing identity verification and validations” at the IRS, according to the award.

The notice describes the contract as a “sole source order,” meaning Equifax is the only company deemed capable of providing the service. It says the order was issued to prevent a lapse in identity checks while officials resolve a dispute over a separate contract.

The IRS and Equifax did not immediately respond to requests for comment.

Why would they? Clearly one is above the law and the other is above complaint.

“WOW, YOU ALMOST HAVE NEARLY HALF OF THE COUNTRY OFFERING ‘SOME’ CONFIDENCE IN YOU.” Reuters: Yay, Those Expressing at Least “Some” Confidence in the Press Increased from 39% to 48%.

IT’S A COOKBOOK! Orwell’s ‘1984’ Is the Future Your Liberal Friends Want.

CONSERVATIVES FOR CRIMINAL JUSTICE REFORM:

With leadership from Republican governors and legislators and groups such as Right on Crime, conservatives have pushed to rein in runaway prison spending and adopt cost-conscious correctional policies that improve public safety. Starting 10 years ago in Texas, more than half of all states have now shifted course, changing laws to ensure that violent offenders serve hard time while those who are not a danger are steered toward less expensive alternatives that can help alter the paths of their lives and make communities safer.

Taxpayers benefit. In 2007 the Pew Charitable Trusts projected that state prisons would grow 14% over five years, costing states $27.5 billion more. Instead, the reforms have bent the curve. The state prison population is down 5%. Between 2010 and 2015, 31 states reduced both crime and imprisonment, proving that fiscal discipline and safe streets can go hand in hand. . . .

In 2007, the Texas Legislature projected the state would need 17,000 new prison beds over the next five years, at a cost of $2 billion. Conservative lawmakers and then-Gov. Rick Perry instead expanded the use of drug courts, community treatment and other alternatives. Ten years later, the reforms have allowed Texas to avoid more than $3 billion in new spending and close four prisons with four more planned closures. Crime has dropped to levels not seen since the 1960s.

Since Texas’ pioneering move, other states have followed. After South Carolina passed substantial criminal justice reforms in 2010, the state cut its prison population by 14%, closed six prisons, and saved $491 million—all while crime continued to decline.

The latest example is Louisiana, the state with the highest incarceration rate. In June its Legislature enacted a 10-bill reform package that is expected to reduce incarceration by 10% and save more than $250 million over the next decade. Some savings will be directed to programs that reduce recidivism and help crime victims. Six of the nine bill authors were Republicans.

Many of America’s reddest states are proving that criminal justice reform works: Georgia, Utah, South Dakota—the list goes on. Strong conservative leadership has been essential. Continued progress won’t be possible without it.

Well, luckily those states probably won’t go Democrat any time soon.

UNEXPECTEDLY: After Week Of Worrying About Police Power, Liberals Now Wants Cops To Take Your Guns.

MARK STEYN ON “THE EMPTY PADDOCK:”

We have been, for the most part, very lucky. The foot-soldiers of the jihad are mostly dimwit Mohammedans: they have youth and energy and ideological fervor, but they are also largely stupid and unimaginative. The old guys are less energetic, but also less stupid: if Isis were right and there really were Islamic Stephen Paddocks – 40-50-60-somethings, worldly and full of low cunning – things would be very different.

Indeed.™

REUTERS: Las Vegas gunman’s girlfriend has left Philippines for U.S.: sources.

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MORE SUPPORT for my theory, expressed earlier, that Ruth Bader Ginsburg was the source in that Jeffrey Toobin anti-Gorsuch piece from last week. If RBG can’t handle having Gorsuch around, perhaps she should retire.

I agree that this latest Toobin piece reads like fanfic. But then, that’s a lot of legal journalism these days. But it’s ultimately sounding a hopeless note: “In short, Ginsburg was saying to Gorsuch that he and his allies might control the future of the Supreme Court, but she wasn’t going to let them rewrite the history of it—at least not without a fight.”

I hope this means that Gorsuch is open to revisiting Baker v. Carr and Reynolds v. Sims, which were poorly considered and destructive, as I’ve noted more than once. At any rate, Congress could fix this under its Guaranty Clause powers, as I will explain in a forthcoming law review article.